Part 3

_House of Commons, Monday, May 20._--JAMES GALLOWAY WEIR is a sore man the night. Ross and Cromarty hide their diminished head--or should it be heads?--before the illuminated mountain tops of Inverness-shire. THE MACGREGOR has done him at last, done him hopelessly. Since the present Parliament met, he and THE MACGREGOR have run pretty evenly, neck and neck in race to show what Scotland can do in this way when it concentrates its mighty mind on the effort. In former times Ireland had monopoly of the Crank as he was returned to Parliament. Scotch Members preserved traditional reputation of their country as the home of dour-headed businesslike men. WEIR standing alone would have sufficed to tear this fable to tatters. THE MACGREGOR unaided would have confounded the tradition. The combination of talent was irresistible, overpowering in its force of conviction.

Between these eminent men there has been, from the first, a feeling of generous rivalry. THE MACGREGOR, as befitted the riper genius, has been more successful in concealing it. Whenever he has put a question about the Crofters, WEIR has managed to drop in with supplementary inquiry. His name appearing in the report, watchful Scotia would take note that THE MACGREGOR was not the only one of her sons who, in a foreign land, cared for her interests. THE MACGREGOR, on the contrary, not less loftily because without apparent design, ignored WEIR. There is reason to believe he did not regard with fullest measure of appreciation his intellectual capacity, his business aptitude, or his parliamentary manner.

"A puir creature!" he said, one night, staring straight up at the gaslit roof. There was no one up there at the moment, and as this happened to be the night when WEIR had eleven questions on the paper, by way of showing his want of confidence in the Government, and was approaching the ninth with ever deepening chest notes, there is too much reason to fear that at that moment the Member for Inverness-shire was not unconscious of the existence of the Member for Ross and Cromarty.

JAMES GALLOWAY'S boot-issuing and blood-curdling tones; his tragic reiteration of the phrase, "Is the right hon. gentleman a Weir?" The solemn sweep of his arm as he places the reluctant _pince-nez_ on his disputatious nose; his stare of haughty surprise when Lowlanders opposite titter at his inquiry about the lost handle of the parish pump in outraged Pitlochrie; his habit of turning up at unexpected places on either side of the House below the Gangway--these things are unique in their way. In the aggregate they would, save for THE MACGREGOR, have placed him on an unapproachable pinnacle. After to-night he will reign alone. The other King of the Bedlam Brentford has abdicated. But evermore there will rest over JAMES GALLOWAY the chill shadow of the mighty triumph with which his rival closed his public career.

Nothing in the parliamentary life of THE MACGREGOR became him so well as its quittance. The artful way in which he led the SQUIRE OF MALWOOD up to confession of intent with respect to the Crofters Bill; the SQUIRE'S humble plea to wait till Thursday; the MACGREGOR'S stern response, "That is not good enough for me;" then his swinging march down the Gangway (almost you could hear the pibroch playing); his halt before the Mace; his stately bow to the SPEAKER; the march resumed; the fresh halt at the Bar; another sweeping obeisance (again fancy feigned the faint sound of the distant pibroch), and the MACGREGOR was o'er the border, and awa'.

"A puir daft body," said JAMES GALLOWAY WEIR, his musing sight, by strange coincidence, also fixed on the ceiling.

_Business done._--THE MACGREGOR shakes the dust of the House of Commons from off his feet. In disordered state of things that followed, paralysed Government escaped defeat in Committee on Welsh Disestablishment Bill by narrow majority of nine.

_Tuesday._--Surely never was such a place in the world as House of Commons for bifurcations. Within memory of man there was a time when, of two sides of the political highway, Liberals trod one, Conservatives paced the other. Now House is broken up into half a dozen parties, each with its infinitude of sections. Most depressing and disappointing development of this tendency appears to-night. The Eldest-Son Party is just bereft of one of its most active members by WOLMER'S accession to Earldom. General GEORGE CURZON, whose forces, on full muster, counted two, is now reduced, on Queen's Birthdays and other State occasions, to reviewing ST. JOHN BRODRICK, _seul._ Force of habit still strong, and, when speaking to-night, he made House acquainted with the views on constitutional question which "I and my friends hold."

It may be singular, but so is the number of the friends. CRANBORNE, in one of his fiery speeches, made it clear just now that the Eldest Sons are divided on the question which General GEORGE CURZON, Quartermaster-General ST. JOHN BRODRICK, and the late Army (now gone to another place) made their own. This defection from within not made up by sustentation from without. JOSEPH, having got a little mixed between what he said on Coleridge peerage case, and the exact reverse put forward by him with equal confidence on the Selborne case, judiciously absented himself to-night. COURTNEY also absent. PRINCE ARTHUR sat ominously silent on Front Bench, whilst DICK WEBSTER backed up SQUIRE OF MALWOOD in denouncing position assumed by General GEORGE and Quartermaster-General ST. JOHN. As for the Army, multitudinously alluded to as "the Hon. WILLIAM WALDEGRAVE PALMER, commonly called Viscount WOLMER, now Earl of SELBORNE," it was withdrawn, interned as garrisons are at particular crises of civic life. House gladly ordered issue of new writ for West Edinburgh. Constitution remains unreformed, and WILLIAM WALDEGRAVE--to quote with slight variation from the appropriate source of tombstone literature--

Called hence by early doom, Lives but to show how sweet an Earl In House of Lords may bloom.

_Business done._--Clause III. added to Welsh Disestablishment Bill.

_Thursday._--The Bashful BARTLEY, temporarily overcoming a constitutional weakness that is the despair of his friends, and has proved a serious block in the way of his public advancement, put himself forward just now. Is disturbed by dalliance of Lord BRASSEY, sometime ago appointed Governor of Victoria. BARTLEY has conviction that if, in good time coming, his party should acknowledge faithful service by appointing him to Governorship, he would lose no time in entering upon his new sphere of usefulness. That course Lord BRASSEY might be expected to follow. "Instead of which, he goes about the country--stealing ducks," BARTLEY, impelled by swing of the quotation, was about to add. Pulling himself up in time, he added, "making party political speeches in favour of candidates at elections."

SYDNEY BUXTON, in his most Severe-Young-Man-manner, informed the not quite Blameless BARTLEY that BRASSEY not yet set out to undertake Governorship of Victoria because he is not yet Governor. HOPETOUN'S term does not expire till September, and unless it were desired to run the risk of a sort of colonial _Box and Cox_ scene, it would be well he should await the due date of his succession.

BARTLEY blushed, said nothing--at least, not aloud. To himself muttered, "They may say what they like; but, after all, bashfulness is the best policy."

The TIRESOME TOMLINSON so affected by this repulse of an esteemed friend and neighbour that when, later in sitting, BARTLEY, forgetting his pious resolve, moved amendment to Budget Bill exempting a wife's revenues from income-tax, T. T., rushing out to support him in division lobby, lost the way. When he arrived at lobby door, found it locked. Rattled at handle; kicked panel. For only reply came whisper through keyhole, in voice he recognised as TOMMY BOWLES': "Too late. Go away, you foolish virgin."

"Bad enough," said T. T., "to lose chance of voting against the Government. But why TOMMY BOWLES should call me a foolish virgin, I don't know. Do I look like one?"

_Business done._--Scotch Grand Committee set up. Opposition straightway go and gather sticks wherewith to knock it down.

_Friday._--Came across little group in lobby just now steeped in brackish waters of tribulation. Only three of them, but they seemed to have all the trouble of the world divided amongst them.

"What's the matter?" I asked. "Been listening to two hours' debate on Budget Bill in Committee?"

"Worse than that," said HART DYKE. "Haven't you heard? CARMARTHEN, riding out on his bicycle, came by sudden turn on steam-roller. Bicycle shied; pitched DOLLY off."

"Poor DOLLY!" said JOHN PENN, mopping his eye with a J pen-wiper. "He fell on his head."

HART DYKE and MARK LOCKWOOD (together)--"Oh, then he's not hurt." Sudden brightening of faces as load of apprehension removed from mind; walked off quite cheerfully.

Gracious, kind-hearted comrades! So pleasant, amid turmoil of political warfare, to come upon idyllic scene like this, and learn how sweet a thing is friendship.

_Business done._--Budget Bill through Committee.

* * * * *

Transcriber's Note:

Sundry missing or damaged puctuation has been repaired.

This book contains dialect, some deliberately fractured English words, and the occasional French word. All have been retained; it's Punch!